MISCELLANEA. 
704 
how well qualified to discharge the duties of the branches of medical 
science they profess, and in which they have been brought up. 
It has been my lot to attend three cases of superpurgation in 
the horse within the last ten days, caused by the administration of 
purgative balls compounded by druggists, two of which cases ter- 
minated fatally within twenty-four hours. It is a crying and ex- 
tensive evil that country druggists and apothecaries should continue 
in the practice of compounding the prescriptions of quacks for 
horses, &c. ; and it is penny wise and pound foolish for owners of 
horses to resort to them, instead of legitimate veterinary practi- 
tioners. The danger of giving badly compounded medicine to 
horses is very great, and the consequent evils and loss are decidedly 
more than can be calculated on by any but veterinary surgeons. 
I must confess, were I to place before the public, in round numbers, 
the loss sustained by owners within the circle of my own observa- 
tion and practice during the last three or four years — not to speak 
of prior periods — the amount would be startling, and would be a 
serious and appalling lesson to holders of every description of live 
stock. 
Professional veterinary practitioners never prescribe for, com- 
pound, or administer medicine to human patients : they conceive it 
out of their line, although in most instances well qualified to do so ; 
therefore it is the more inconsistent for persons confined to a dif- 
ferent sphere and line of practice to interfere with the veterinary 
profession. In God’s name, let apothecaries and druggists com- 
pound the prescriptions of qualified veterinary surgeons ad libitum; 
but let them not deal in quackery, and do extensive evil. Aloes, 
the principal compound of horse physic, is a gum-resinous sub- 
stance, and cannot be compounded sufficiently well in summer to 
form balls. This should always be done in winter, when every 
respectable veterinary practitioner prepares what he is likely to 
require during the summer. Now, it is not unfrequently the case 
that apothecaries will not take the pains, or go to the trouble, of 
taking proper material for horse medicine ; and in almost all in- 
stances they leave the compounding to their shop-boys and inex- 
perienced assistants, who — fancying that any thing is good enough 
for a horse, and that quantity, not quality, is sufficient — in making 
balls and boluses, &c., sweep into the mortar the dust of drawers 
and sweepings of counters, not aware that the constitution of the 
horse, and the diseases to which he is subject, should be treated as 
delicately, if not more so, as a human patient. I write thus, I may 
repeat, from the daily experience I have of the extensive evils con- 
sequent on quackery, and the compounding and administering of 
horse medicines by persons totally ignorant of veterinary science 
and practice. M. S. 
